Irresolute about raw foods.

[Maxtrong]

Hello! This forum looks great!

I love the paleo diet because it makes amazing sense. I have often thought about how our ancestors probably didn't stand over the campfire cooking a whole lot.  My thoughts wandered to us being more scavengers than hunters and that if we ate meat, it was more likely to be food left behind by bears and such
This lead me to search for raw meat and other raw foods and how they affect health.
I am very excited to try a lot of raw foods, but I am hesitant about the high meat and other raw meat variations. Plus, raw eggs etc.

Now, I have an actual question, is there an easy way to start? I know tastes and textures may be an issue at first, so does anyone have any starter tips (ie, mixing eggs into raw milk or cream/blending them into water?)
Also, does pickling count as raw?
Again, the site looks awesome, I hope to learn a lot.

[Maxtrong]

Apologies if I asked anything out of line. I didn't read the stickies in the other forums first.
I should have separated my introduction and my question.

[Dr. D]

Welcome! Tell us a bit more about yourself and your goals/experiences.

High meat can be scary. Especially when your taste buds aren't used to foul foods. As long as you air it and mix it you should have no problem. 2 week after starting my raw diet I put some liver that I was having trouble finishing into a jar and aired it daily, tasting bits as I went along. Last week marked 3 weeks it was fermenting amd it barely tasted 'bad' but nobody else in the house can stand the smell. So basically it only took me a month to grow to enjoy it.

everyone does raw differently, including transition. Just know what you need that's healthy and start eating as much as you're comfortable. All raw food is slightly unsafe (nothing is sure in life) but getting it from healthy sources greatly lessens the risk. No hormones, antibiotics, as close to eating aa they would in the wild as possible. Grass fed land animals, chickens eat bugs and seeds. seafood wild caught only. Be sure to include fat and organs.

[Poncho]

haha well I only know how a sick little 19 year old canadian girl would start.
And it would be by going out and buying raw eggs,
and then after those were eaten, going and buying grass-fed hormone free steak.
Those two were my starters, because eating raw eggs and raw steak is pretty well heard of I think.
From there I started eating a lot of raw fish, because thats also a very 'safe' thing to do.

After that it got easier to be brave and try the things that I was always told would make me sick.

Nothing has made me sick so far, and its been about 6 months now.
I have been getting food from different sources all of the time, no issues.

I think its been a lot of fun, because I can finally eat without being in pain after! woo

[Maxtrong]

Hey, thanks for the replies! I definitely understand there are a few risks involved with raw foods, but I feel the healthier I got from eating those foods would prime my body better for defense against such risks. Obviously not ALL the risks, but some

I was thinking of just some red meats, organ meats and eggs to start. I'll also be making some different kimchi's, so they might help make it somewhat more palatable at first.  I'm still out on the high meat, I don't know that I could be in a relationship and keep rotting meat in the fridge lol.
I think I'll have to start with a percentage, say, 20% raw food and add 5-10% per week up to 100.
A bit about myself: My name is Jason, I live in Vancouver, Wa with my girlfriend. I am a fat personal trainer (sounds oxymoronic) so, obviously I don't get many clients
I am formerly a boxer, powerlifter and armwrestler. Started boxing again and am looking to go more towards a leaner, quicker, more powerful body type more like Stephen Amell(Oliver Queen)
Being the fat slow guy isn't fun anymore.

[Dr. D]

Hey I'm from WA too! I'm more southeast from you near Chelan if you know where that is. Really any way to start thats possible for you works. The key is to go for the highest quality ingredients. Grass-fed is good and wild is even better. Be sure to include fat and organs, even prioritize them. High meat doesn't "need" to be done really until you are an advanced raw foodist, and comfortable. I thought to myself high meat sounds crazy and a few weeks later I wanted more health that this diet had to offer, so I started fermenting some. Take it at your own pace and be comfortable. This diet is not a race, its not a cure, it IS a healing diet, and healing takes time.

Tyler (a mod here) says doing mixed meals can be quite difficult on digestion, since digesting cooked and raw requires different processes. He suggests keeping a meal either mostly raw or mostly cooked, for digestive purposes. Searing your meat for taste is not included in that, as it is mostly raw. But say your breakfast is a small raw meal, lunch and dinner are cooked. Then over time you make your lunch raw. Then you make breakfast and lunch larger raw, until you finally make dinner raw, or however you feel comfortable eating. Personally, I'm almost liking the one meal a day, at dinnertime, eaten over the course of 2-3 hours. I notice when I eat breakfast, it almost slows me down a little, and the digesting at sleep can be relaxing. Others, like Lex, eat one meal in the morning. Others space out tiny meals throughout the day, almost nibbling. I suggest to know your goal, and work your way there, adjusting the path as necessary.

Maybe one day we could share a raw meal

[goodsamaritan]

I started with what was easy for me.

Raw Fruits, no problem.
Raw veggies, have to choose which ones have no anti-nutrients.
Raw animal foods, I started with what was already acceptable for me: Sashimi and Raw Eggs.

After I got sick of various sea food, I started trying land animals with Tyler's suggestion to sear a little less each time.

[LePatron7]

I definitely understand there are a few risks involved with raw foods, but I feel the healthier I got from eating those foods would prime my body better for defense against such risks. Obviously not ALL the risks, but some

Raw animal foods can be very safe if you choose a good source and much safer than conventional meats.

http://www.eatwild.com/foodsafety.html - shows lots of studies on how safe pastured animals are.

There's also freezing as they do in sushi preparation that would kill parasites if you're concerned about that.

[TylerDurden]

Here's an important post to read:-

http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/important-info-for-newbies/sticky-advice-for-newbies-wishing-to-slowly-ease-into-a-raw-animal-food-diet/

Here are further posts of interest:-

http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/important-info-for-newbies/

Don't worry re the high-meat. Get started on the other stuff first. If you have a garden,  you might eventually consider burying the high-meat instead of putting it in the fridge. Of course, you would have to be very careful not to allow flies to insert their eggs around the plastic container or you might be faced with crawling maggots after a while.

We all have had initial fears when starting this diet. I, for one, was convinced at the start that  I would die of food-poisoning sooner or later and was pleasantly surprised when my health started to recover. It took me 3 years to get up the courage to eat high-meat but I then too was surprised to find that it had a positive not negative effect. It's just a question of breaking the conditioning, nothing more.

[jessica]

the easiest and tastiest way to get into high meat is just to let your steaks and rumps sit out uncovered on a rack on a plate in your fridge, they wont get rotten or moldy but they will dry out and start to age.  if you have a nice clean refridgerator to start (which you should no matter what you are eating!) you will have no offensive odors, and your meat will just start to get a little tough where its dry but soso tender in the middle, it makes eating cheap cuts of meat a whole lot easier.  I have strips of fresh venison that were waaaay to chewy, so I just left em on a plate in my fridge and they have been aging anywhere from 4 month, they don't smell, they just have a rind, and ive been eating a little bit at a time. 

im up here in the pacific northwest too, near Pullman Washington right now, but moving down towards Ashland Oregon on Monday.  You have great sources of the best quality meats and wild game up here, take full advantage!

I started 5 years ago with raw ground beef with added in egg yolks and spices.  and lots of raw liver.  ive only been sick once at its because I (knowingly) bought bison from a vendor with horrible refrideration problems, so in plastic that stuff probably froze and unfroze many times and to be honest my immune system and health were not up to par.  and I had bad toots for a few days, nothing horrendeous, just bad gas.  And it went away!